Rush Limbaugh At CPAC: Doubles Down On Wanting Obama To Fail (VIDEO)

At his closing speech at the CPAC conference, conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh doubled down on his widely-controversial claim that he wanted President Barack Obama to fail, insisting that he meant what he said, and chastising those who were critical of him.

"This notion that I want the president to fail, this shows you the problem we've got. This is nothing more than common sense and to not be able to say it? Why in the world would I want what we just described: rampant government growth, wealth that is not being created yet is being spent? What is in this, what is possibly in this that any of us want to succeed? Did the Democrats want the war of Iraq to fail? They certainly did. And they not only wanted the war in Iraq to fail they proclaimed it a failure.... They hoped George Bush failed. So what is so strange about being honest and saying I want Barack Obama to fail if his mission is to restructure and reform this country so that capitalism and individual liberty are not its foundation?"

The crowd, watching in three individual ballrooms because of overcrowding, went absolutely wild.

"I know what's going on. We are in the aspects here of a historic presidency, I know that. But let me be honest again, I got over the historical aspects of that in November. President Obama is our president. President Obama stands for some things. He could be a Martian. He could be from Michigan. I don't care. It doesn't matter to me what his race is. It doesn't matter. He is liberal. That's what matters to me.... I want the country to survive. I want the country to succeed."

Limbaugh, whose speech went on more than an hour than what was planned, didn't end there.

"Ladies and gentleman of the United States, the Democrat Party has actively not just sought the failure of Republican presidents, and policies, and now war for the first time. The Democrat party does not stop at failure. Talk to judge Robert Bork, talk to justice Clarence Thomas about how they try to destroy lives, reputations and character. And I'm supposed to say I don't want the president to fail? We are in for a real battle. We are talking about the United States of America... remaining the country we were all born into and reared and grown into. And it is under assault, it has always been under assault. But it has never been under assault like this, from within."

The red meat speech was more than well received among the adoring conservative crowd which punctuated his address with repeated standing applause. On the flip side, it is hard to see how the elected officials of the Republican Party welcome this. Limbaugh's first declaration of hope for Obama's failure put a lot of GOPers on the line: did they stand with the brash talk show host against the president? Though, to be sure, there was little push back. Now, however, Limbaugh's invited more of the same line of questioning.

Comments

[foofoolaroo]

11:13 AM on 03/15/2009

I see a terrorist. Someone wants us to fail? Looks like a duck, walks like a duck...

[KateRachel]

06:34 PM on 03/08/2009

I see "Citizen Lame" Starring Orson Welles look-alike limbaugh, w/o the beard or intellect.

[Swatantra]

08:20 PM on 03/07/2009

This is really getting old. OLD.
The most effective way to defeat a voracious ego maniacal attention hog is:

IGNORE HIM.

[WeHopeRushFails]

05:47 AM on 03/08/2009

There's a much better way to defeat an ego maniacal attention hog than ignoring them, because ignoring them never really works because some idiots will always give them the attention they seek. And even if they got no attention at all, that would only serve to encourage them to go to greater efforts to get the attention they want.

So, instead of ignoring them (which is futile because they're infantile), discover or develop some positive way to make use of their negativity so as to completely and utterly counteract the negative attention-getting effects they sought.

In other words, turn their sour lemons into sweet lemonade:

http://www.IHopeObamaSucceeds.com

This shows the ego maniacal attention seeker that putting their efforts and energies into negativity merely ends up being totally self-defeating in every way.

[zcaspi]

03:08 PM on 03/07/2009

I despise Limbaugh, but I think it would be good to see him run. I think it would bring a real difference in politics. It might spur real change in government as apposed to the lie of change that Obama spewed (no lobbyist in his cabinet and yet has nominated at least 6 as an example). Love him or hate him, someone has started the countdown: http://www.limbaughclock.com

[indy girl]

12:48 PM on 03/05/2009

There were about a hundred sponsors of the CPAC meeting, most of them the far right-wing organizations you'd expect. However, I was surprised about AT&T and Google. There also were black, hispanic and non-Christian groups in the sponsor list. (I think we can assume these people have never listened to Rush rail about them on the radio!) The full list of sponsors of the CPAC: http://www.cpac.org/sponsors.html

If you would like to complain about these two companies sponsoring an event with Rush Limbaugh as keynote speaker:

Google: 1-650-253-0000
Corporate Office: 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 CEO: Eric Schmidt

Google's diversity and inclusion statement can be found here:
http://www.google.com/intl/en/corporate/diversity/community.html

*******

AT&T: [e-mail]
Corporate Offices: 208 S Akard St, Dallas, TX 75202 CEO: Randall Stephenson

Read this page about AT&T's diversity, outreach and multicultural programs, which reads in part: "At AT&T, diversity encompasses respect for all individuals......"
http://www.att.com/gen/corporate-citizenship?pid=7738

Their corporate policy is an odd contrast to Mr. Limbaugh's hateful messages.

[VaryingViewpoint]

12:33 AM on 03/05/2009

Rush Limbaugh is a perfect illustration of what creates polarization within the United States!

When Rush is equating his football analogy, it's at a child's point of view. Me want to win, you must lose, period. I don't think you can get much smaller then that when viewing the world with such a narrow perspective. I think that might even be pre-school conceptual thinking.

The point is, as for Rush Limbaugh and The Republicans are concerned, they're right, and they're right all the time, they can do no wrong. The only people that can do wrong, and will do wrong in their eyes, is anybody and everybody that doesn't agree with their narrow point of view because there just isn't another way then, their way to go about doing what needs to be done.

My way or the highway is really their motto. Sounds a little like a child not getting along with others and sometimes resorting to bullying to get their way.

I thought we were a society that frowned on that sort of childishness, narrow minded ideology. No compromise, no looking at someone else's point of view. If you want to play in my sand box, you play my way or the high way buddy, and I don't care if you ever come back.

Not trying to work together doesn't seem very mature, or civil.

Visit http://varyingviewpoint.blogspot.com/ To read my entire commentary

[tomterif]

04:23 PM on 03/04/2009

It's more than just a little interesting to see "new young Obama generation" people filling up HuffPo boards with comments like we see here, many giving no indication that such persons can in any way comprehend Rush Limbaugh's absolutely clear, cogent, perfectly well reasoned comparison of his "wanting Obama to fail" * to the American left's "wanting America to lose the Iraq war" [which they most certainly did !, and would STILL greatly love to see happen, though those prospects (for brave young American men and women in the military being soon deployed from Iraq in ignominy, leaving a disfunctional "failed state" behind them [to be "blamed on George Bush", in a most celebratory way]) are evidently "not looking AT ALL good" for such persons, today.].

* Because [he loves this country, wishing to see EVERYONE in it succeed, and] he sees President Obama resorting to economic policies that Rush Limbaugh sincerely believes will sooner or later ALWAYS fail ; He also CLEARLY stated if President Obama switched to different economic policies, that'd give America its' very best opportunity to GROW its' PRIVATE ECONOMY, not its' FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, and ultimately TRULY SUCCEED ECONOMICALLY once again, then Rush Limbaugh would most gladly SUPPORT PRESIDENT OBAMA 100 % on that !, showing this ISN'T "simple partisan politics" at all, or any dislike of Barack Obama personally, as many Democrats [ones even capable of understanding Rush's point, and who "bothered" to discover it] are now straining mightily trying to deceive others about.

[ichan]

11:13 PM on 03/06/2009

To Tomterif and other Rush lackeys...

I can’t speak for the FAR left but the general non radical liberal opinion on the war was never that we wanted to fail. Many supported the war to stop Bin Ladin.The problem was that WE DID FAIL. WE WERE LIED TO, WE DID FAIL and we are angry!
And why shouldn't we be. We entered a sovereign country…and murdered thousands and thousands of innocent people...those who weren’t killed had to go through and still go through unbelievable suffering…we are crying about our housing bust, and our 401K’s... can you really begin to compare this suffering to what many Iraqi’s have been going through every day…and we did this with the justification of WMD and links to Bin Ladin. They weren’t there. So now we spin it as liberation, and it’s going to work out when you see it in 100 years…PLEASE... YOU PEOPLE MAKE ME SICK TO BE AN AMERICAN IF YOUR CLAIM IS THAT YOU KNOW AND ARE WHAT AMERICA IS.

[ichan]

11:13 PM on 03/06/2009

When you start from a premise that the WAR was just, then you can spin it however you want. If there were WMD, if we got Bin Ladin, if they didn’t bungle the occupation and lay off the military and cause irreparable damage to the countries infrastructure, if they worked with other countries to solve what is a global problem we wouldn’t be so ANGRY. You seem to be intelligent so do you understand this distinction? Our attacks on Bush/Cheney/Rethugs and the war was not that we wanted them to fail, we were angry because they DID fail on nearly every level of human decency.

So don’t even try to contrast or compare the anger we felt after learning the truth about the botched, immoral war WITH something as petty as Rush’s angry rhetoric and I know it all ideologies directed at economic and social policy of a president who’s been in office for less than 2 months. If you can put these 2 together and have it make sense for you then you are mentally, and morally retarded.

[ContraEgoiste]

03:11 PM on 03/04/2009

The Conservatives that push the virtues of the "individual" should take a look around. They may come to the realization that everything they own is the product of someone else, it wasn't made by their hands. Everything they know is something they learned from someone else. Their very existence is entirely dependent on being a member of a SOCIAL construct. Unless they plan to give it all up and go live in the wilderness. And this even means the clothes on their back, because unless they grew the raw materials themselves, weaved it into fabric and sewed their own garments, they are wearing the benefits of living in a society.

It's pathetic how these people have been brainwashed into fighting against their own interest and have been scared into building a bogey man. It is pitiful to see how easily they are duped into believing that anything that advances, progresses and continues to evolve our human collaboration and secures our wellbeing, in other words our social construct, is the same as Communism. They have been trained, no, scared into this knee jerk reaction, because the ones holding the power don't want them to wake up and realize what it is that they are supporting, and that it is their own enslavement.


- Continued -

[Reaganwater]

01:45 PM on 03/04/2009

Someone in the media needs to ask Limbaugh if he believes the members of our armed forces should have respect for Obama . Yes or No. If he says yes , make him justify that in light of his earlier statements .
Either way , I would like to know how this man is allowed to remain on Armed Forces Radio in light of his stated desire for and and efforts toward seeing the Commander in Chief fail .
Counter-morale programming on military radio ? in a time of war ?
can this be justified ?

[ConVo]

11:12 AM on 03/04/2009

Stanley, and the rest of you libs need to come out of your Obama fog and face reality. Nobody who knows anything about American history, or the workings of a free democracy support Obama's policies. If you want the U.S. to be something it never has been, then fine, just be honest about it. If you believe the wealth of this country belongs to the government, and they should decide how much you get to use for your family, fine, just be upfront about it. Why are you all so ashamed of being Socialists? If you believe this is the way it should be, why don't you just say so. The fact that you pretend to support personal responsibility and capitalism, while at the same time, supporting policies that shift power to the government for the purpose of redistibuting wealth, is why your leaders can't lead.... because they try to govern while hiding their true agenda. No principals! You think you are somehow intellectually superior to your fellow citizens and that the government needs to protect them from themselves. Well guess what, that's how your leaders feel about YOU! Conservatives believe the average U.S. citizen is capable of making better decisions concerning their lives than a bunch of pompous politicians. Safety nets are fine, the nanny state is un-American. Yes I said it, un-American! Read a history book sometime.

[Stanley]

01:37 AM on 03/04/2009

The man made Howard Stern money making trash talk with a fascist POV. He is outrageous on purpose and ratings soar with each blathering pronouncement that gets followed by the press. He was inconsequential in defeating McCain and rendered impotent and angry by his own party. This political schlock-jock bathes in his newfound relevance as the voice of the angry and out of power. Recognizing him as the defacto Republican leader requires him to up the ante up in his hateful rhetoric or be seen as a caving in. Begging the audience to admit they want the President to fail is problematic. The arch conservatives created this mess and then hope it now completely goes to hell so that they can justify there return to power. Somehow that is an impossible argument to make politically in the second month of the Obama Administration. Let them ride this horse for a while and watch the centrist Republicans sweat as they are asked to defend Rush and kiss his ring while Obama comes off as calm, cool and reasonable.

[emstrem]

11:02 PM on 03/03/2009

People crack me up. Rush Limbaugh is an entertainer, he makes his money off of being controversial, why this is surprising to people is beyond me. I voted for Obama and yet some of these schemes he's trying I also hope fail...big time.

Rush's key point was Obama is not trying to raise up the poor; he's trying to knock down the rich. Putting salary caps on people will be a boom for innovation too. Where in the American Dream does it say that hard work will be rewarded...but only up to a point, after that your going to have to work for free???

And for all of you people laughing at what Rush said, and how in 4 years it will be an easy sweep for the democrats again, I say you might want to wait and see what your boy can do first, so far he hasn't done anything but appointed a lot of people with bad taxes. If he cannot lift this country out of the quagmire its in there will be no way he gets reelected.

[patricksmom]

01:10 AM on 03/04/2009

So you are a dittohead? I voted for Obama and in no way hope his programs fail. I voted for progressivism and for money to flow in a different direction. I;m sorry, but if the top people in this economy are only in it for the money, we need a rotation of people. The rich , under Bush, saw a 270% increase in wealth, while the m iddle class lost jobs and shrank.

[TarzaninChrist]

06:46 AM on 03/04/2009

Even the money geniuses of Wall Street can see the problem with the ideas of Obama's plan. I do not wish for failure for the President, but humility make a great leader. and when so many people are warning against and showing past failures of the same system, the President should listen.
If I remember correctly, Bush had the lowest unemployment rate in history and some of the biggest tax cuts pre war. So during times of war it is a given that jobs maybe lost and that the economy will hurt, in regards to the market. I think that the increase in wealth for the upper class in an injustice only when it comes from unethical business practices. Which in many ways President Bush had a chance to crack down on some of these issues. As far as the strategy of tax cuts to the rich, I understand the theory and I to believe it can work, but not with a business system that rewards CEOs for running business in the ground. There is no incentive for them to make the company run and actually higher more people. So I guess what I'm going to say is if they give the rich tax breaks, fix business regulations first.

[kiwi1]

08:17 AM on 03/04/2009

Congratulations... Well put.... I'm sorry though you voted for Obama... this will be one decision you will regret making in the coming months.

[Ron Lajoie]

06:56 PM on 03/04/2009

I know that you will be eating your words in the coming months.

[JohnBryansFontaine]

09:56 PM on 03/03/2009

Is Rush Limbaugh a Fascist?


http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AuMTG2HWyS2NbLulQlthwH4azKIX;_ylv=3?qid=20090303174214AA15Vf5

[panderwatch]

03:42 PM on 03/03/2009

Why was the Daily Show the only one to catch the part when the crowded booed in response to the mention of "newspapers." That's right, daily newspapers. Any kind. Not "liberal" papers like the NY Times, but newspapers in general. Does the conservative wing of the Republican party wish all printed communication from any source to fail even when they are firmly in their camp (Washington Times, NY Post, etc.)? I think I just heard Milton Friedman and Barry Goldwater roll over in their respective graves. Calling Irving Kristol, are you there? Put down your Wall Street Journal and come to the phone!

[geaaronson]

03:39 PM on 03/03/2009

Too bad. Looks like the Conservative movement has just signed a suicide pact with rush limbaugh. I for one wish that they not fail the conscience of so many Americans. Unlike Rush who stridently hopes for the failure of american interests under Obama, I hope for the success of the republican party. But it looks as if the next election their negativism will sweep them out of office. We´ll end up with 66 Democratic senators and 275 democratic congressman and the democrats will be virtually unchecked in their wish list.
Steele should have stuck to his guns and banished Rush from the podium

[antifluff]

04:43 PM on 03/03/2009

Can you specify to what "American" interests you are referring? Libs attack conservatives repeatedly without showing evidence of crime or guilt. Please let us know why believing that we should be able to make our own lives without gov't interference is wrong. Please explain why a larger (therefore more corrupt) gov't is necessary. Please explain why the "educated" people that believe innocent life is a matter of convience cannot have an opposing view. Please explain why money that was used for charities of choice must be converted to forced contributions to the corrupt machine.

[patricksmom]

01:16 AM on 03/04/2009

You live in your own fantasy world where libs attack conservatives without crime or guilt, where anyone in any party is advocating that the government runs your life. The great A Lincoln, first Republican president, would repudiate your narrow views. He accomplished a lot in the line of our President Obama's aspirations.

[Factbeacon]

05:53 PM on 03/03/2009

So you are saying that with 66 and 275 dems in the congress, the republicans will be done. This government was established with two political parties: the ones who favor tax cuts, capitalism, and individual responsibility (republicans) and the ones who favor slavery, more government, not trust people with spending money, and higher taxes (democrats). Imagine the USA with democrats in charge 100% with republicans being just a third wheel to their agenda. How is that American? Wanna know when that last happened? Civil war, when the democrats succeeded from the union and fought for a one party system all their own. Republicans were nice enough to let them back in. So now that you democrats are returning the favor, how long until slavery is reinstated? It was the platform of the election that separated this country. "That'll never happen, cus a black man is president!" Pht. Obama is a puppet, a celebrity. He does what people want him to do. PEOPLE DONT KNOW WHAT THEY WANT!!!!! GOVERNMENT DOESNT KNOW WHAT YOU WANT!!!!! This is why we have that whole 2/3 majority to pass laws, to encompass more thoughts than just the liberals.

[patricksmom]

01:13 AM on 03/04/2009

Yes "factbeacon" that is American if the electorate put 66 dems in the senate. Yes , our President is doing what he promised in the election, but he is not a puppet or a celebrity, nor a confused old man. Our President believes in individual responsibility, capitalism with regulation and that the economy should benefit all that work. So your ridiculous comments on slavery probably do belong in the civil war period.
As for thoughts I;m waiting for Rush et al. to have any.